Upgrading…and fixing
Tech April 17th. 2008, 11:07pmI’ve got my Ubuntu “Hardy Heron” 8.04 LTS beta upgrade running in the background as I type this. It says it’ll take less than an hour to download (I love my fast connection), and I’ve clicked a SINGLE button to upgrade the entire OS. Amazing.
I’m really pushing my luck by upgrading today. This afternoon, right as I was settling in to watch The Daily Show on my Cowon D2, something weird happened. I was watching the show, but all of a sudden the screen went dark and it output a bunch of random numbers. The hardware wouldn’t turn off properly, so I did a reset. It rebooted, but then crashed at the opening screen. Now it no longer turns off or on. I hadn’t upgraded the player, dropped it, or did anything to change the player in months. I had a weird issue earlier in the day where files I had deleted didn’t disappear from the player properly. I don’t know why that would have occurred, but I’m not sure if it is related.
We’re going to take the player to the Cowon service center tomorrow, and hopefully I can get it back quickly. The last time I had to return the machine,I had accidentally bricked it when I had upgraded the firmware. This time it is absolutely not my fault. I wonder if they can fix whatever is wrong.
I was looking at players in a similar class at the store while they were telling my wife where to go to fix the player. Even a year later, there is NOTHING on the market in Korea that can TOUCH the features, battery life, and flexibility of the Cowon D2. The 52 hour battery life is so insane that it DOUBLES the closest players in the same league.
I’m so happy with the purchase, so even this problem will be forgiven. Maybe if I’m really lucky, they’ll even upgrade my unit to one with a few more gigs of onboard storage. I’m not crossing my fingers or anything, but it would keep me from needing to upgrade my mp3 player for a while.
10 Responses to “Upgrading…and fixing”
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April 18th, 2008 at 1:46 am
Ubuntu upgrades like a dream. 2 clicks and it was done. Wow.
April 18th, 2008 at 2:18 am
Worth the upgrade? What are the “killer features?”
April 18th, 2008 at 11:18 am
I thought about getting a Cowon media player last year, but the high prices (even here in South Korea), and small hard drives, put an end to that idea.
Instead, I went with an Archos 605 Wi-Fi Portable Media Player (160 GB). It is really great; however, the volume is rather low without headphones or using external speakers with it. But it is able to download 160 hours of movies and television shows straight from my DishNetwork dvrs. It also functions as a dvr as well. That alone makes it worth every penny in my book. Plus, it only cost $300 U.S. at the time of my purchase. It is now up to $360 though.
http://www.amazon.com/Archos-Wi-Fi-Portable-Media-Player/dp/B000S5UY2G/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1208483879&sr=8-1
I’m also glad I didn’t stray after reading this review:
http://www.engadget.com/2007/12/04/cowon-q5w-gets-reviewed-needs-work/
April 19th, 2008 at 9:57 am
Hold off on the Hardy upgrade. It’s lacking anything “killer” to make up for anything that might potentially break (and a few things have, to my annoyance.)
The Cowon D2 is NOT a full on PMP. It is a portable, pocket-sized mini-PMP. It’s FLASH based, so it has no moving parts and will not have a hard drive that crashes on you. I looked at the Archos 605 when I was duty free shopping in Hong Kong. It was mighty tempting, and it’s one of the best in the “full PMP” category, no doubt, but their accessory plan seemed like overkill. If I wanted a fully functioning machine the thing almost doubled in price. No thanks.
April 19th, 2008 at 11:46 am
I lucked out. I got the works for $300 which included the docking station, adapters, and other odds and ends at Target on trip home last year. Then 2 hours before I was to leave on the plane, I spotted an even better deal at Wal-mart for $280 with everything as well. Yeah, you have to keep an eye out for deals.
I just can’t believe the prices on electronics over here. I can buy the same Korean brand TVs and computers for between 25-50% off the price back in the U.S. When I browse the BestBuy.com or FRYS.com websites after work, the older students can’t believe what they are seeing. I thought about buying a new external WD 250 gig hard drive at Costco with a coupon today until I saw this deal for a 750 gig external hard drive at Fry’s. Same price, but a difference of 500 gigs. Insane. I’ll get it in four months when I’m back in the states.
http://shop2.outpost.com/%7BvK8NPbpOwvogJizTZNlsUQ**.node2%7D/product/5518510
April 20th, 2008 at 9:32 am
Good news on the Sarah Connor front.
http://community.tvguide.com/blog-entry/TVGuide-Editors-Blog/Ausiello-Report/Ausiello-Scoop-Fox/800037914
April 22nd, 2008 at 10:52 pm
[...] week, my Cowon D2 died. Luckily, there is a service center in the city, so my wife could get it repaired the same day she [...]
July 17th, 2008 at 4:41 pm
Hey, I have just bought a D2 but was wondering about updating the firmware. Is the update on the international site the same as on the korean site as i’m in Korea and have bought a korean D2? or do i get the korean firmware. Cheers
July 17th, 2008 at 5:57 pm
Korean firmware is what you need for the Korean D2 purchased in KOREA with a DMB tuner. If it doesn’t have a DMB tuner, the International firmware should work.
What does the current firmware when you boot say?
July 21st, 2008 at 9:18 am
It’s not got DMB and it says 3.57 when I boot it up. I have played with it all weekend, it’s amazing!